


A Bear and Lemon Tea

by CaptainAmelia22



Category: Captain America (Comics), Captain America (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, Kid Fic, Tea Parties
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-16
Updated: 2014-07-16
Packaged: 2018-02-09 01:50:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1964376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainAmelia22/pseuds/CaptainAmelia22
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Papa," she whispers, her tiny body pressed against his arm and her lips tight to the shell of his ear.  "Wake up Papa."  </p>
<p>His lips twitch when her fingers poke into his side and her knee connects with his stomach, but still he doesn’t open his eyes.  This is the one thing he loves about mornings-His wake-up call.  </p>
<p>"Do you want to have a tea party with me and Bucky Bear, Papa?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Bear and Lemon Tea

The sound of her laughter chases the nightmare away. 

"Papa?  Papa, are you awake?"

Her warm breath, smelling of toast and the marmalade she loves so much thanks to Steve, washes over his face and he fights off a grin, pretending to sleep.  

He barely remembers the nightmare now, now that she has come to save him once more and not for the first time, he thanks her silently.

She is too young, too innocent, to understand his thanks anyway.  And he wishes she could stay that way.  

But the world is cruel and she is only three.  

There is still time to learn.

"Papa," she whispers, her tiny body pressed against his arm and her lips tight to the shell of his ear.  "Wake up Papa."  

His lips twitch when her fingers poke into his side and her knee connects with his stomach, but still he doesn’t open his eyes.  

This is the one thing he loves about mornings.

His wake-up call.  

"Do you want to have a tea party with me and Bucky Bear, Papa?"

She whispers loudly, her lips on his cheek now and that knee of hers is pressing even more firmly into his gut.  How can a three year old be so bony?

_Jesus._

"Bucky Bear’s going to be there?"

She giggles the moment he asks and pats his cheeks with sticky, marmalade-y palms.  And now there are  _two_  knees pressing into his gut and there is curly red hair falling into  _his_ eyes and bright green eyes are begging  _him_  to a tea-party.

That nightmare is long lost.

And three has an awful long way to go before the world gets in the way.

He grins up at his daughter and tucks those wild curls behind her ears, every second of this cherished. 

Every second of this remembered.

"Did Mama make us tea, malaya medveditsa?" he asks as he scoops her into his arms and slings her over his shoulder.  She giggles at the nickname and at his fingers tickling her sides and he grins.  "Sofia, dorogoya, where is Bucky Bear?" 

She pulls herself up, using the metal of his shoulder and his ear as leverage, and cranes her head around his so she can look at him.  

"I got him alllll dressed up for our party, Papa!" she crows and her bright brown eyes (his eyes, her mother’s hair, their princess) sparkle as she reaches up and begins to braid some of his bangs that have managed to slip free of the messy knot he’d pulled it into the night before.  "He looks really nice Papa but you don’t right now.  So I might have to find you something in my bathrobe okay?"

He smiles at that, at her tiny, chubby, precious fingers braiding his hair and hopes to god this is not Natasha’s idea. 

"I think you mean ‘wardrobe’, Sophie," he murmurs when they finally arrive at her room, just down the hall from his and her mother’s.  

She simply hums non-noncommittally and tries to do a French braid on the left side of his hair.

He can already feel the knots those baby fingers are making but he doesn’t care; he has a mine-field to navigate and bear to rescue.  

"Jesus, brat-what’d you do, reenact World War II this morning?"

Toys cover every inch of the floor, hats and scarves drape every standing surface and in the very middle of the room.

Is a table covered in a delicately made China tea set decorated in Soviet era scroll work and imagery.

"Uh oh."  

Gentle fingers, callused and strong enough to crush his trachea with barely a squeeze, press his side and as he takes in Bucky Bear’s one-eyed gaze and relatively threadbare, if still noble, appearance, a voice that will always give him nightmares of a different sort, murmurs, “It’s fine James, let her use it.”  

Green eyes, as different from his and their daughter’s, meet his as their daughter wriggles free of his arms and a small smile twitches her lips as she presses her fingers gently to his cheek.  

"I love you," he whispers as he leans into her touch.  "Natashenka, moya dorogoya ty moya zvezda.”  

Sofia glances up at that, her hands full of a floppy, flower encrusted straw hat and a hideously bare turquoise feather boa, and grins.

"Papa, why do you only call Mama your star in Russian?" she asks as she wraps teeny-tiny sticky fingers around the cool metal digits of his left hand and tugs him towards one of the tea-table’s wooden chairs.  

It’s far smaller than he is and his knees almost connect with his chin; it doesn’t matter though-she wraps the boa around his throat a bit too tightly and slaps that hat on his head-and suddenly he’s the “Grand Vizier Papa Bear”

He huffs the feathers free of his nose and chucks her under the chin, his other hand flashing out to pinch her mother’s ass-Natasha simply snorts and twists his fingers free with a warning  _James_.  He grins at her and leans in close to bump his nose against their daughter’s.  ”Because your Mama was always the star that led me straight in Moscow, Sofie,” he murmurs as the little girl straightens his hat (knots grow on knots in his hair with her ministrations but he doesn’t care.  He doesn’t care.  This is heaven).  

Sofia giggles at the face he pulls when the hat tugs on his hair and pats his cheek.  ”Am I a star too Papa?” she asks, her palms patting his cheeks once more.  ”Am I your star? Like Mama?”

 His grin is a little wistful as he leans into her touch now and he blows a feather out of his mouth so he can say, “You’re my shining star, pitchka, always and always.”  

Natasha closes the door gently behind her at that, a small smile on her lips as she watches her three bears playing, and the last he sees of her are her bare feet and her deep red hair drifting gently over her hips.  

He doesn’t have much of a chance to second-guess his morning’s activities though, because within seconds of the door closing his other red-haired girl is sloppily pouring him tea and thrusting a crumbling Oreo in his hand.

"Papa!  You’re supposed to stick your pinkie out-like this!" she crows as she demonstrates proper tea-etiquette and he shares a sardonic glance with the listing bear at his side.

"Of course, Princess, my apologies," he says formally, with a severe bow of his head in her direction and a firmly upright pinkie.  "Forgive your Grand Vizier.  He has been long away in the wilderness, guiding your Bucky Bear home safely to your arms."  

She grins at that and for the first time in days, since he and Steve had been sent undercover in search of Madam Hydra and some of her seedier goons, he finds himself relaxing.

_If Natasha ever breathes a word of this_ , he thinks idly as he watches his daughter force feed her oldest toy disgusting black cookies with “cream” innards and watery lemon tea long cooled, _I’ll force her to watch Barton’s vines of Lucky falling asleep in leftover pizza every single night before we go to bed._

"I love you Sofia," he murmurs suddenly, snatching her into his arms as she runs by, jabbering in a mix of Russian and English too fast for him to really understand. She shrieks breathlessly as he cradles her gently under his chin and presses her nose into his throat.  "I love you so much, my little bear."

She finally stills-actually eases in his arms- and those sticky darling fingers of hers trail through the feathers wrapped around his throat for a long moment as she considers his words.  

Finally, as his shoulder stiffens and his nose truly begins to itch, she pulls his chin down for a kiss.

"I love you too Papa Bear," she whispers, a stunning smile on her lips as she strokes her fingers gently along the scruff coating his jaw.  "Ty moya zvezda, tozhe, Papa.”  

His heart lurches in his chest at that, at being called her star, and he presses a sloppy kiss to her cheek, making her giggle once more.  

"It’s time for lunch, pitchka, and I’m pretty sure your Mama has a thing or two to say about the Oreos on your face," he growls as he snatches up Bucky Bear and his darling and prepares to carry her to her Mother and a warm washcloth.  

"No Papa!  No!" she crows, between breathless giggles that echo in their toy-scattered apartment.  

And isn’t this the best kind of nightmare.

The one that holds the promise of truth?

Somehow they always manage to steer him right, his little bear and his shadowy star.

They always manage to save him.

"Oh James," Natasha sighs as she takes their general dishevelment in with a long accustomed eye.  "What am I going to do with you two?"  

Both of them grin at her, dark brown eyes sparkling with the same mischievous light, and he reaches for her, pulling him into his Oreo crusted arms as well.

"I love you," he whispers into their hair, something always telling him to say this as many times as he can before the day is over.

Something telling him nightmares always have a way of coming back.

Despite the one-eyed bears at his side and the Soviet made China tea-set full of cool lemon tea.  

This is what heaven feels like.

And it makes hell all the worse. 

_I love you both so much, moi dorogiye…_


End file.
